Kalaniketan Wedding Mall

Kalanikethan Wedding Mall's brochure reads, and I quote: "Wedding is a once-in-lifetime event in one's life. Many ideas, imaginations, memories make it a sweet happening. But the preparations for this unique event are so tedious, that they leave one and all fatigued... Kalanikethan, the new silky sensation, has been providing a wholesome shopping delight... Once you step in Kalanikethan Wedding Mall, a you don't have to go anywhere else. All the bride and the bridegroom have to do is 'to be there'. This unique mall provides all-in-one services and products required for a hassle-free wedding..."

Pause.

Now that you have, hopefully, stopped guffawing at the atrocious copy, replete with typos et al, you can concentrate on and fully appreciate the fact that Hyderabad's, er, "new silky sensation" (what on God's sweet Earth does THAT mean?) really does "strive hard to makes (its) customer's life easy".

As you browse through this 4-storied, one-stop shop for all things wedding, you know they take their USP very seriously. Like its Hyderabadi competition (Meena Bazaar, Chandana, CMR among others), Kalanikethan stocks yards and yards of traditional clothing for women (saris, salwar kameezes, dress material) in a plethora of fabrics - buttery crepes, flowy georgette, stiff raw silks, crisp chanderis, heavyweight brocades and what-have-you - either plain or embellished (on the first and second floors).

It also sells blindingly sequined bridal ghagra-cholis (on the second floor) a smaller stock of men's Indian traditional and formal wear - designer kurta-pyjama sets, sherwanis - exquisitely stitched and finished (also on the second floor), and baby and kiddie garb (on the third floor), both casual and ethnic. The in-house tailor also creates garments for women. The men, unfortunately, must suffer discrimination - Kalanikethan only alters men's clothing.

This umbrella mall further sells the other 'usuals' - jewelry (gold, diamond, pearls and artificial), silverware, lingerie, footwear, hand bags, accessories, watches, footwear - phew - and even odds and ends like breath mints and deodorants. For the bridegroom with stale breath and the bride with stinking armpits. The sheer genius.

What truly sets Kalanikethan apart from the Meena Bazaars of this city, and as the unintentionally funny brochure claims, the rest of South-India (apart from its mammoth and obscenely ostentatious chandeliers) are its "Navratnalu", a whole range of wedding-related services offered by the shop through its event manager, Vasu Varala.

Varala, in a nutshell, takes care of the all the aforementioned fatigues associated with weddings; he will book purohits, conceptualise and order invitation cards, hire food caterers, even create a honeymoon package - all for a minimum of Rs. 5 lakh, maximum Rs. 50 lakh. No, you read right.

And while we are on the subject of fat fees, Kalanikethan Wedding Mall's price tags are as hefty as the competition's. That's because money grows on trees. Then we pluck off the ripe greens (and blues, purples et al) and head to the nearest shop to splurge on wedding attire, and event managers. Of course we do.

Anyhow, while Kalanikethan's salesmen claim that they sell saris for as small a sum as Rs. 200, I did not come across a single sari priced Rs. 200, although I did search fervently. The other end of that price range is Rs. 1 lakh, interestingly also the price of seemingly plain but rather rare black pearl necklace on sale. "This necklace is made using South Sea pearls, which are very precious because they are rare," informs the well-informed salesman, quite cultured himself.

To conclude, this agarbatti-fumed mall, like other upmarket stores sharing the same profile, caters somewhat to the middle class, but mostly to the Uber class. Wander in at your own peril.

They have opened an unit in Chennai in the name of Shree Nikethan. This shop is very expensive and the quality of products they sell are the worst. We got carried away by the colourful looks of the clothes here and bought 2 cotton kurtas for Rs.5000. Just in one dip in water (not a wash with soap) the colour got spread all over and became unusable. When we complained they were very rude and they said that the clothes where not theirs. I had to throw them in front of their shop and walk out. Kurtas bought for less than Rs.1000 in other shops in the same mall is lasting much better.

When I called Kalaniketan Chaitanyapuri and told them that I want to exchange a kurta pyjama. I did not have a bill but the transaction was made through a card and hence can be tracked. They willingly asked me to come over to the store and get it exchanged but when I actually went all the way to the mall he tried to look for some flaws in the condition but then as it wasn't even opened he couldn't find any flaws in the condition and then asked me details like the date of purchanse when I gave the date & time of purchase he said they make thousands of transactions and hence cannot pull out the bill. But how many transactions are really made in a particular section in one hour in a location?When he didn't want to exchange it there was no point in asking me to come over all the way ?Saleswomen in the sarees section also have a big time attitude - they can't give a customer 2-3 min time to decide on their purchases. No courteousness at all.

I would say that Kalanikethan has not employed salesmen who are gender sensitive. While taking trial of Sarees some of the salesmen try to touch sensitive body parts intensely that makes you uncomfortable and can be termed as sexual assault. when we raised our voices the salesperson used to be disappear and supervisors too didn't take any action.

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